Hell Was Better
by PineappleFairy69
Summary: Oneshot about Mukuro's past, mainly about his life in the Estreano Famiglia and how he escaped. WARNING contains angst, blood and headcanons! NO PAIRINGS!


This is a oneshot about what I think happened in Mukuro's past and during the experiments of the Estreano Famiglia. Please note that the story is based on what we know and on my own headcanons. If you have a different opinion you are free to share, but please don't post any hate or rage.

* * *

I have to admit I don't remember everything of my childhood. I just remember some simple facts before things changed. The body I was born into was a very good one and although my mother seemed to have died during my birth, it seemed like I was lucky once more. Italy was a nice country and being a member of a powerful Mafia Family wasn't the worst, but I soon realized I had been totally wrong.

It all changed so suddenly and I think I was the only child that understood a little of the meaning of everything, but that was because of my life experience. I know many people don't believe me about remembering my former lives, but it is true and I can make use of all those experiences, mainly of my illusionary and battle abilities, but also languages and other stuff is still present in my head. That's why school started to be boring for me.

Well I didn't get much of a chance to visit school in this life anyway.

But I'm wandering from the subject.

* * *

It happened during spring just before I was about to become five years old and that's from where my memory is fully available. Unfortunately. The Estreano Family I belonged to fell in disgrace and they lost their status in the Italian Mafia.

The anger and hatred that followed from this disgrace changed everything and I realized we would suffer a lot. One would say I could have done something that day I realized the change and I might have been able to do something since I already was able to use five out of the six paths of Reincarnation, but I was naive, yet not strong enough back then and not even five years old.

Additionally it went so fast.

They stuffed all the kids together in one room and locked the door. No one knew what was going to happen and although I had that strange feeling the plans of my family surpassed my imagination.

In just one week they reconstructed the basement to some sort of laboratory. Despite the crying and the begging of their own children we were locked down there in the huge new complex. I remember everything was white and cold. They had built two different rooms that were filled with beds. One room was for boys and the other one for girls. There was no bathroom just one large room with toilets on the one side and showers on the other. We had strict times for using them and there always were at least five armoured men with us.

The last room we used together was the cafeteria. There were long white tables and benches inside. I never found out where the kitchen was, but the food we received always was the same pulp that was as white as our surroundings. Besides, there only were laboratories, surgery rooms and observation rooms.

We had to get up all together at five in the morning. Then the girls were taken to the bathroom and afterwards they took the boys there. At six o'clock we received our pulp and then there was only pain that lasted until the evening. We weren't allowed to go to bed before ten o'clock.

Sometimes if you were lucky there was no pain during the day, but then we had to stay in our room and keep quiet.

* * *

Now you're probably wondering why they started such a torture on us, but it is easily explained. The disgrace made them wanting to proof their value and so they started experiments, trying to create perfect soldiers and fighters that would be able to fight and kill those who decided to banish them, the Estreano Family. However since they needed probands for their experiments they used their own children. We were dispensable.

So now you know about the reasons and the surroundings, but I suppose you still cannot imagine the pain and the fear the children suffered.

Everything started by checking our abilities. We were divided into categories and everybody received a barcode. With these barcodes they were able to identify us, our skills and the experiments that were planned with us. My barcode was put on my neck. That's why I keep my hair long by the way.

They also quickly noticed that I was able to manipulate one's mind and to create monsters and things. Unfortunately they were able to control my power by using sedatives and since I was still a child I couldn't just force them to let me go so easily.

And so, I had to spend about five years in those white laboratories which appeared to be more like hell than the real one.

* * *

Although my hatred grew every day I started to behave in the manner they wanted us to. It was the best to do, because if you didn't stand out they left you in peace for at least some time. Those who didn't follow that simple rule were also tortured during night. But it wasn't easy to sleep anyway. There always was someone crying, sobbing or screaming and if you closed your eyes there were nightmares immediately. So we never slept the whole night.

I remember one night very well. There were some crazy guys who said they were trying to escape. Please, don't get me wrong, because it's not like I had given up or something, but it was just impossible to escape the laboratories in my current state. However what those kids tried was an escape through the air shafts. They were caught not even ten minutes later.

Since they wanted to give us a warning they woke us up and brought us to the cafeteria where they had brought the five refugees. They stood there in one line facing the wall in front of them. Then the boss of the Estreano Family told us something about loyalty and being obedient. It was a disgusting speech. Five soldiers came to the front, each of them carrying a large rifle. I knew what was about to happen and I guess I wasn't the only one realizing that, but still there were children screaming and crying when they shot the five boys in their head.

It was the last time someone tried to escape.

* * *

I already mentioned the white pulp we always got to eat, didn't I? There was no taste in it, but we ate it nevertheless, because it was the only food we received. If you didn't eat it up you had to starve. And there was another simple rule. You should never share your food or try to steal more. Never.

However some of the kids shared their food nevertheless. For example there was that little girl, probably around six years old. She had been in the labs during the morning and although she sat at another table I saw her shaking. She was in pain and probably dizzy. Her best friend sat next to her and she gave the girl her own ration.

She had been taken by surprise.

In front of everyone two soldiers pulled her off the bench. She was told to stand up right in the middle of the cafeteria and then she was shot dead. The blood sprinkled everywhere. It was on the floor, on the tables, on the children next to her and I also saw the red drops in the white pulp of some children.

One boy that sat rather close to me stared on the blood stains in his food. Warm, fresh and red. He started to cry silently and swallowed before he kept eating the mixture of pulp and red that now probably had the metallic taste of blood.

It was either eating the stuff or starving.

It was the last time someone shared food.

* * *

You might now think that most of the children were just shot dead, but that's not it. Most of them died during painful experiments and in the arena. The arena was a small empty laboratory. There was just one large mirror inside and behind that mirror the doctors and scientist sat, examining the children in the room and taking notes. The goal of this was to test the experiments.

You probably want to know what that meant, but basically it was just a fight between two children. They had to present their abilities and their strength and only the strongest could survive. If you refused to fight you were either shot or tortured or starved out.

I've only been there once, but I will tell you about it later. Fact is that always only one child came back from there and so most of them died in a ridiculous exhibition fight.

Well, but I suppose you are not listening for general information so let's become more detailed. No one of us knew what kind of experiments they did on the individual one. We were forbidden to talk about it, but sometimes there were hints. For example those wearing bandages around their head were definitely experimented on the brain. Those with bandages around the arms were filled up with medicaments and some sort of substance. Whereas for me, I was wearing a bandage over my right eye because they had performed surgery there.

I said I had been capable of my powers before, but they hadn't been that powerful yet. That was because it was hard for me to activate the different paths and generally they blended into one another. I couldn't just make use of one path at once so illusions became monsters and monsters became illusions. But it seemed like those people had found a way to make it easier for me. They gave me that red eye that grants me support in not only choosing the path, it also makes everything I do stronger and much more powerful since it is pure.

Sure you might think I should be glad and thankful for such an opportunity and somehow I am, but yet everything they did to me was against my will and it was back then when I swore myself that I would never let anybody else decide about me. Life should be my own decision.

* * *

However, so what they did was doing a lot of surgery to my right eye and some sort of DNA extraction and multiplication. I guess they believed they would be able to transfer my DNA into another human to evoke the same powers I'd got. But they were wrong. Someone has to go through hell to receive the Paths of Reincarnation. It's not in the DNA.

About my eye, they didn't switch it, but they altered it and they made me able to switch paths consciously and on my own will, but in return I paid with the eyesight of my right eye. The surgery was painful every time, but the most painful surgery was when they awakened the fifth path, the Path of Humans.

Yes, I hadn't been able to use the Path of the Humans back then, but I knew I would be someday during this lifetime.

It would be too much to explain everything in detail and I still don't know everything about all those surgeries, but mainly they awakened the path by using plain force. That is why I have to turn around my eye these days to actually activate the Path of Humans. Of course I know this, because they tested it back then and this is actually one of those things I can remember rather clear. Probably because of the pain.

* * *

They took me right after the breakfast and brought me to one of their surgery rooms. There I was strapped down on the operating table. How much I hated that feeling of not being able to move at all. Being at their mercy. It was disgusting.

As always they removed the bandages from my right eye and started their surgery. They rarely used anaesthetisation and sedatives, but yet I withstood the pain most of the time. But not today.

After a general check-up and drawing some blood for further research some armoured men entered the room. They didn't do anything, but stayed close to the entrance holding rifles in their arms. I immediately noticed that this would be different and then one of them shoved his fingers under my right eye without any warning.

The pain was unimaginable. It felt like someone was stabbing my eyehole with a knife. And then the guy turned it around. I could feel the hot blood running down my right cheek whereas wet salty tears covered my left one. At the same time there was a push of energy and power running through my body. I felt totally overpowered.

I pulled at the bandages that chained me down and they tore apart like paper. I could feel arms holding down my burning body and there was a loud and horrifying scream. Later on I knew that it had been my own voice.

The pain grew even stronger and I was wondering when my brain would finally just turn itself off. Then everything went black and I could hear some voices and a long painful peep. Then there was silence and the pain was gone. I felt light and peaceful and suddenly I calmed down. I knew what had happened and although I probably should have felt regret I just felt salvation.

But before I could enjoy the feeling of freedom the pain returned. It started in my chest with a blow that went through my whole body awakening every single nerve. I was terrified, scared and almost devastated, because the feeling of life had returned.

A few moments later I was able to see again, however I was not able to move anything else. My muscles were sore and yet I couldn't feel them at all.

Not that they had just reanimated me, but they had also given me something that kind of switched of my whole physical abilities. I couldn't move. I wasn't able to talk or to scream. I was just able to breath. And I was able to feel the pain. And so they left me there. Alive, but in sorrow.

* * *

But it still had been a success. They had awakened the Path of Humans in my mind, although I always had to turn my eye to activate it. However I don't like the fifth path myself, though that's probably more because it always remembers me of those hours lying there in solitude and pain.

After a couple of hours a nurse came into my room. She cleaned the blood away and did some general checks before she left again. I think I actually stayed there for about one and a half days, because it was afternoon when they brought me back into my own bed.

A few days later I had totally recovered and on the outside I stayed quiet and obedient, but on the inside I carried hatred, anger and rage. It was for sure now that I had to leave this place.

* * *

But don't you think these were all the experiments I had to go through. There was another one, but I have to admit that it was the last thing they ever did to me and it also granted me bloody revenge.

They came and took me during the night. Me and another child. They took us to the arena and I knew this was the time to present my skills to them. But it would not be in a way they wanted me to do it.

We stood there the boy and I. Facing each other. He stood right in front of the mirror behind which I knew people were standing and watching us. I knew that this would be the only chance and I knew it wouldn't be easy, because there was another boy in the arena and he would definitely attack me. He just wanted to survive after all.

My face showed no emotion. It never had so far. I kind of felt sorry for the other boy, but I couldn't let my guard down and I knew it wouldn't be possible to spare him. He was a desperate child fighting to survive just to feel more pain. Maybe it was better to end his suffering anyway.

Then he attacked me and he was as fast as a lightning bolt. For a second I got scared, but then I remembered the Path of Demons and I easily activated it just in time to block the attack of the little boy. He probably was just seven years old. Much younger than I. I probably should have felt sorry, but I didn't when I switched to the Path of Hungry Ghosts, calling for a huge black hound that immediately jumped forward ripping off the boys head in one move.

The blood was everywhere even on my clothes and my skin and I showed an emotion for the first time. A slim smirk appeared on my lips while I was facing the large mirror.

"He who sows the wind shall reap the whirlwind." I said while the hound broke through the thick glass of the mirror.

* * *

The siren gave me a headache and yet I walked through the white floors that were sprinkled with blood. The huge hound was still at my side and it ripped off the head of everybody crossing our path. Soldiers, scientists, doctors, they were all dead.

Doors were widely open and it seemed like the children had broken out of their rooms. At least there had been several boys and girls crossing my path. I let them be. They were just scared probands.

However not all of them seemed to take the chance of running away. There were also some of them sitting on the floor and in the corners. Waiting, crying, not knowing what to do. I let them be.

There still were some members of the Estreano Family left. They had barricaded themselves in the cafeteria and I was on my way. In front of the door I hesitated for a second until another smirk appeared on my lips.

The hound immediately followed my silent command and broke through the door, charging into the room. I heard screams and shots then it went silent. I followed my beast inside not caring for the red blood on the floor that got stuck on my bare feet.

While entering the room I finally changed the path to my favourite one, the Path of Hell, the illusionary path.

There were still people living inside the cafeteria, however they didn't have any weapons. They were defenceless. I heard people whimper and beg, but there was no reason for me to pity those who had been greedy with pity for me.

I created a small trident that appeared in my hand and stopped in the middle of the room. My eyes were examining the surroundings. Then I smiled.

"Congratulations. Your experiments had been a success."

* * *

It was silent. Blood was dripping from the ceiling. It was like a warm red shower. And although normal people would find it disgusting I felt relieved and free. I had been able to get my bloody revenge. It was done. And yet it hadn't been the end but the beginning. Because these events made me hate the Mafia. You might now think that it was due to the experiments and everything, but that's not the point. I knew that the Estreano Family felt in disgrace because of the Mafia and I thought that the Mafia should have known that someone powerful doesn't accept such a fact without some sort of rebellion.

They had left us alone in the hands of sick people that didn't feel any guilt in using their own children as guinea pigs just to regain their power. And that's why I started to hate the Mafia.

Don't get me wrong I never asked for pity and I still don't, but it's the fact that no one took responsibility for this suffering. In the end it was no one's fault, just like it had never happened. And that made me angry. And so I swore to myself that I would never forgive the Mafia for what they had done.

When I turned around I noticed two boys standing in the door. They watched me in disbelief whereas I wondered what they were still doing her. I gave them a slim smirk.

However when I told them to leave they just shook their heads and since then they stick together with me. I quickly noticed that they almost adored me for saving them from this place. I didn't think of myself as a hero or something, but I let them their belief. I have to admit that I actually started to like it.

Well, I guess I could go on and tell you more about my childhood. After all I left the Estreano Family when I was about ten years old so it appears like my childhood wasn't over yet. But actually it was over. Actually it had been over when everything just had started, because my life stayed bloody.

Hell was better.


End file.
